Retrospectively, it feels that all I did in March was keep the post man busy. When the first proof copy of #MCFSB arrived, it wasn’t good enough, and Diana and I decided to change the font to make sure the book was easy to read. It’s the necessary corrections that slow you down and unfortunately we ,had to postpone shipping by two weeks because it took so long for everything to arrive and arrive in the quality I was happy to pass on to my Kickstarter backers.

Because of the loss I made in the previous year, I decided to switch from color print to black and white, so everyone who supported both of my Kickstarter projects got an extra copy for free.The reason I decided to make the books black and white was because I liked the black and white copy far more than I liked the colorful one. However, if you look into the digital book, you’ll still see all of the illustrations Sara Combs made in their original (and colorful) state.

If you have been following my approach to creating products, you know that packaging is highly important to me. It’s quite incredible that even though it’s 2016, it’s still hard to get nice envelopes that don’t cost a fortune in Austria. I ordered a huge box of envelopes from the UK and three weeks later, I sent them a follow up email wondering what happened to my parcel. I was rather bummed when they said they never shipped my package because it was too big. Instead of giving up and buying white envelopes, I decided to postpone shipping to be able to deliver the kind of package to my backers I’d like to receive myself. A glittery one. One that makes you say “WOW!” (I think I succeeded.)

Having had such an amazing experience with Skillshare, Sarah and I decided to make another Skillshare class. This time, my plan was to explain everything I’ve learned about self-publishing and pass it on to everyone who considers going the independent route. My plan is to share the sort of information I would have loved knowing when I first started. Just like last time, I bought fancy flowers and Sarah skillfully rearranged my entire apartment to make the set look visually appealing.

As part of the shoot, we sent out books to all the backers but the ones in the US and Canada, which I shipped from New York just one week later. I still consider myself incredibly lucky for having so many people supporting all my big and small ventures. Another side effect of my trip to New York was that I was able to spend some more time with the Kickstarter team. While I’m happy working remotely, after having done it for so many months, I’ve learned to appreciate talking to people I work with face to face.

Given I had so many backers from the US, I immediately booked a flight to ship their books from NYC. (Yay!) It might have been more of a hassle to go to the post office in New York given how difficult it is there (you might remember my experience from last year), but it was cheaper and also more fun, which I think is the main reason why one should do a Kickstarter project.

As a self-publisher, your job is far from done after you’ve written your book. After we raised the money, it was time to make the most important decisions and actually finalize the print and e-book files. I wasn’t 100% satisfied with the options we had our community vote on, so we continued working on an additional option based on the feedback we received.

For the cover, I wanted to connect analog and digital even more, so we added #smartcreatives to the title for me to be able to connect with everyone who has read the book and shared about it online. My favorite part of being a self-published author is that I’m able to talk to the people who enjoy reading my titles.

Luckily, Kickstarter and I have decided to extend my contract for another six months. In the past ten months, I focused on reaching out to potential creators, but in the future, I will focus on trying to figure out tools and strategies to increase the success rate in the German-speaking countries, a much more exciting and far more challenging focus of my work efforts.

I have also began talking to the Impact Hub Vienna team about joining them as a social media coordinator, but after joining a couple of their meetings, we mutually decided that it might not be the best fit. I’ve learned in the past that work styles must align; otherwise, a collaboration is almost impossible and given my ability to spend time with the team at their office is very limited, we decided it was best not to explore this opportunity any further.

There are so many exciting opportunities in this world, and as fun as it would be to take on all of them, we sometimes have to diplomatically say “no” and focus on what we’re able to accomplish. In other words, if something doesn’t give you a good reference, it’s not worth proceeding. And if you don’t have the time to do something properly, it’s most certainly not going to result in the feedback you’d for sure like to receive for your efforts.

What are you currently working on and who are you working with? Feel free to hit me up on email!

February felt like a quiet month. I spent the majority of the time dealing with my little side project, This Year Will Be Different, which is a guide to getting started as a freelancer. Once the Kickstarter campaign made its funding goal, the real work began.

First, I had to find a printer. I decided to appoint Kay Printing in New Jersey; if you need a printing company close to New York, they are your people. Cost-effective, professional, friendly.

Then, because I wanted to make receiving the book special, I decided to wrap every single one as if it were a present. Wrapping 200 books takes about 2 days. That’s a lot of time, but now that I see how much people (here, here, here or here) are enjoying this little gesture, I know it was worth the while.

For everyone who hasn’t backed the Kickstarter campaign, the book is available on Amazon. If you want to have a closer look at the contents, check out this page.

But This Year Will Be Different wasn’t the only thing that kept me busy throughout the month. I spent a couple of days working on a social strategy with the team at Badger & Winters. And I’m especially proud of the guys at SCHED, who have finally pushed a feature live on Eventbrite, where I helped them with the UX.

I’m flying back to Vienna tomorrow and would love to have a coffee if you’re around. I’m currently booked throughout March, but if you have an interesting project lined up for April, where you could do with some help, don’t hesitate to get in touch.